Electricity Crisis

There may not be load-shedding at the moment, but constrained supply of electricity remains a mid to long-term challenge in South Africa. As the economy picks up again -as we would like it to – and as aging infrastructure goes offline, supply may not be able to meet demand. The City of Cape Town understands that the cost, consequences and impact of Eskom's load-shedding are a burden on you, your family, our local economy and more. It affects us all.

Electricity tariffs are also rising steadily, and there may be much higher increases again in years to come. This is the reality. It's also an opportunity.

The City of Cape Town understands that the costs, consequences and impacts of Eskom’s electricity crisis are a burden on you, your family, our local economy and more. It's also an opportunity

Let's tackle this together

The City is committed to working together with residents, businesses and other partners to minimise the impact of electricity costs and supply shortages.

Together, we can:

This will help create a more affordable and secure energy future for us all.

What is the City of Cape Town doing?

The City is hard at work finding ways to help residents and businesses minimise the impact of constrained supply, and move towards more affordable, secure and sustainable energy.

Here are some of the programmes implemented by the City:

  • Assist low-income residents e.g. installing ceilings in older subsidy homes
  • Motivate high-income residents to use less e.g. electricity saving campaign
  • Help the commercial sector become more efficient e.g. the Energy Efficiency Forum
  • Enable residents and businesses to sell electricity back to the grid
  • Generate electricity from alternative and renewable sources
  • Train teachers, school children, businesses and community groups on energy efficiency
  • Improve the load-shedding schedule
  • Set up curtailment schemes

The City is doing its best to lead by example with energy efficiency and renewable energy in our own buildings and operations. To date it has:

  • Retrofitted many inefficient buildings
  • Upgraded traffic lights and streetlights e.g. all traffic intersections across Cape Town now have super-efficient LED lights
  • Trained facilities' managers in energy management
  • Trained hundreds of employees on energy efficiency

These projects continue to be implemented, extending the reach and benefits. So far the City is saving about R25 million per annum, and these savings will increase as we do more and electricity tariffs increase. This means more money freed up for service delivery.

The complete Energy and Climate Action Plan is laid out in the City’s 2011 Moving Mountains Report, and see the more recent Cape Town Energy 2040 Vision, which has associated goals e.g. reducing overall carbon emissions by 37% by 2040.

What can you do?

The City encourages you to take advantage of the following helpful programmes and resources without delay. The faster you act, the more you will save, and the bigger difference it will make:

SCROLL TO THE TOP OF THE PAGE